Ebola Outbreak 'Unlikely' in West says WHO as Frontier Airlines Hunts For Passengers on Flight 1143

A volunteer for Doctors Without Borders, receives training on how to handle personal protective equipment to deal with Ebola.Reuters

A volunteer for Doctors Without Borders, receives training on how to handle personal protective equipment to deal with Ebola.ReutersA Frontier Airlines plane taxis the runway at Cleveland Hopkins Airport.Michael Francis McElroy/Getty Images

The World Health Organisation said it is unlikely that an Ebola outbreak will spread from Africa to the West, as US officials try to trace all passengers on board Frontier Airlines flight 1143 who flew with a nurse who contracted the deadly virus.

WHO director of strategy Christopher Dye said health systems in Europe and America were capable of effectively dealing with the disease that has killed 4,500 people so far, mostly in the West African states of Guinea, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Nigeria and Senegal.

"We're confident that in North America and Western Europe where health systems are very strong, that we're unlikely to see a major outbreak in any of those places," Dye told the BBC, adding that the introduction of the virus in the West was however a matter "for very serious concern".